melody barnes served as director of the white house domestic policy council during president obama's first term and joins me now. so someone might ask, we haven't had one for a year, we've had an acting secretary, roberta blank, think, why do we need a secretary of commerce, what does the secretary of commerce really do as the president fills out his cabinet. >> exactly, it's a pleasure to be here with you, as always. i think it's a very, very important job. what we've seen over the years, looking at even through past administrations, is that the secretary of commerce is often an ambassador between the administration and the business community and an important part of an economic team. becky blank did a vafantastic j as the interim secretary. she's got a lot of credibility. but having someone in there of penny's stature and someone who is a business person and someone who is taken seriously by the business community i think will be very, very important for the administration. >> one question that i've been looking at frankly is there are no assistant secretaries of state. ambassadors